Last week, it was reported that Apple had once again become the world’s largest smartphone maker. Turns out this was due to the fact that Apple sold 37 million iPhones last quarter alone! Now, Morgan Stanley believes that Apple will partner up with both China Telecom and China Mobile “over the next year” to make its iPhone available on all three Chinese carriers. That may not sound amazing, but what does is the fact that Morgan Stanley believes that the company will be able to sell up to 40M iPhones in China alone in the next calendar year. This means that Apple could soon sell as many iPhones in China as it sells in the rest of the world combined!

Credit: Morgan Stanley

Remember, Apple sold 37 million iPhones last quarter worldwide, but this estimate is for one country alone. Analyst Katy Huberty suggested the huge untapped potential for the iPhone in China. According to her, Apple can only possibly reach 10 percent of the 150 million “high-end Chinese subscribers” in the country through its current partnership with China Unicom. Last year, Tim Cook said that Apple was only “scratching the surface” in China. She says that she sees a base case of 26 million incremental iPhone sales in China during the 2013 calendar year with the addition of China Mobile and China Telecom. Her bull case suggests 40 million units for an increase of $10 in earnings per share.

Credit: Morgan Stanley

The analyst also suggests that if Apple sees a 20 percent penetration of China Mobile’s subscribers as the company has reached with China Unicom, the iPhone maker would be able to sell 24 million handsets on China Mobile alone next year. Due to the fact that 3G and smartphone penetration in China is “increasing at a fast clip” she believes that the company could sell as many as 36 million units on China Mobile in 2013.

In China, China Mobile is the world’s largest carrier, and offers service to an estimated 120 million high-end subscribers who pay more than 100RMB ($16) a month. The final 10 percent of high-end subscribers are on China Telecom, the third-largest carrier in China.

I’m trying to think of another company that is expected to sell as many phones in China as it sells in the rest of the world combined. Anyone?

A year ago, T-Mobile revealed that it had over a million iPhones running on its network (probably more now). Not only was it surprising, but also revealed the amount of desperation T-Mobile has to support the iPhone. Currently, the iPhone does not support T-Mobile in the US. In addition, it was also reported that the carrier would officially start selling the micro-SIMs that are compatible with the iPhone.

Today, a reportedly leaked employee memo revealed that T-Mobile will begin to offer official support for subscribers using unlocked versions of Apple’s iPhone on its network. Pretty mind boggling for a phone that nobody wants, isn’t it? The memo was published by T-Mobile blog TmoNews.com. T-Mobile employees will start offering support for the iPhone beginning January 30th.

Earlier this month, T-Mobile CEO Philipp Humm said that the company’s wireless operating frequency was the main reason as to why it doesn’t yet sell the iPhone. Apple’s iPhone is known to help a carrier grow significantly, and carriers have even reported poor customer-sign up rates due to not being able to offer the device. In fact, just a few days ago, Verizon reported that over 55% of the smartphones it activated were iPhones. Then yesterday, AT&T reported that over 80% of the smartphones it activated were iPhones too! Going by just these numbers alone, I can only imagine the amount of hit T-Mobile is taking, but dang, they sure are desperate to offer a phone that’s “losing.”

Earlier this week, Apple reported a massive blowout holiday quarter. With over 37 million iPhones sold, it was the company’s best quarter yet. Turns out, last quarter’s results also helped Apple dethrone Samsung to become the world’s largest smartphone maker. Strategy Analytics, a market research firm, revealed that the company pass Apple just by a little bit. However, Samsung shipped an estimated 36.5 million units worldwide in the fourth quarter.

Samsung declined to comment on how many smartphones it shipped last quarter, but it did note a 30 percent growth. Oh Samsung, if numbers were higher than Apple’s, I’m sure they would have revealed that too. In 2011, Samsung was first able to claim the first spot for annual smartphone shipments with an estimated 97.4 million units, compared to Apple’s 93 million iPhones in 2011.

Nokia took third place with an estimated quarterly shipments of 19.6 millions, which was apparently enough for a 12.6 percent market share. That company has seen its market share significantly reduce since its decision to transition from Symbian to Windows Phone. In the year ago quarter, Nokia shipped 28.3 million smartphones.

The report also reveals that total smartphone shipments for the quarter increased by 55 percent year over year to reach a record 155 million, while annual shipments were an estimated 488.5 million units. Now, these numbers may sound insanely large, but it should be noted that there is a huge difference between number of devices “shipped” and number of devices “sold.” The latter is the one which generates the money for a company, and that’s all that matters in the end.

Good, a company that provides secure mobility solutions, reports that according to new figures Apple’s iPad makes up 96% of the tablets activated at the 2,000 companies that use its services. They reported that of the top ten devices it saw activated in the last quarter, Apple’s five iOS models accounted for the top five slots.

The phone that nobody wanted (iPhone 4S) took the lead, quickly jumped to 31% of all activations in the quarter. iPhone 4 was next, followed by iPad 2, the original iPad, and iPhone 3GS. Good also said that Android activations had initially gained some ground in October but “trailed off as activations of the iPhone 4S rapidly ramped up.” It seems to me that Android is “winning” in all areas indeed.

The company also pointed out that businesses related to Life Sciences “witnessed the highest rate of growth” and an increase in iPad deployments.” In addition, while Android fell back in the fourth quarter during the launch of the iPhone 4S. It seems to me that Android’s growth stalling due to the iPhone’s growth is becoming a trend now. Pretty amazing how only three iPhone models are beating Android in every area possible.

Just a couple of days ago, it was reported that the iPhone represented 55% of Verizon’s last quarter smartphone sales. Today, AT&T announced its financial results for the fourth quarter of 2011, and revealed that the carrier reached a new record sale numbers for smartphones. AT&T reported that it saw sales of 9.4 million smartphones, which is double the previous quarter’s sales and 50% higher than the company’s previous record.

Turns out, the iPhone was the driver behind these smartphone sales for AT&T. The carrier reported that it saw 7.6 million iPhones activated during last quarter. Majority of these activations were iPhone 4Ses. That’s pretty surprising for a phone nobody wanted. AT&T also promoted its lead over Verizon in iPhone activations, noting that it has continued to outspace Verizon every quarter since AT&T lost exclusivity on the iPhone last year.

AT&T also noted that it has continued to improve its voice and data network. The carrier reports that more than 80% of data traffic is now coming over the carrier’s enhanced network that allows for “4G” speeds on devices supporting at least HSPA+, such as the iPhone 4S. In addition, the carrier also reported that “call retainability” has continued to increase.

Android is “winning” is something you hear everyday in the press, but in reality that is just not the case. Usually, people make this judgement due to Android having the larger marketshare, but now that’s quickly changing. Just yesterday, it was reported that Apple reported its best quarter ever. During yesterday’s quarterly earnings call, it was revealed that Apple sold 37.04 million iPhones. You know the phone that was considered a flop by pundits. In fact, even Verizon revealed that more than 50% of the smartphones it sold last quarter were iPhones.

Now, according to research firm Kantar Worldpanel ComTech, with just three different iPhone models available for sale, Apple has reached a 44.9 percent share of the U.S. smartphones sales last quarter. Apparently, that was enough to just sneak past the Android platform. Remember, the Android platform has hundreds of devices while Apple only sells three. It should also be noted that these three iPhones lack 4G. Apple’s 44.9 percent share was twice that of a year prior, according to Reuters.

“Apple has continued its strong sales run in the U.S., UK and Australia over the Christmas period,” Dominic Sunnebo, global consumer insight director at the research firm said.

“Overall, Apple sales are now growing at a faster rate than Android across the nine countries we cover,” Sunnebo added.

Today, Apple announced its best quarter ever and its share price soared past $450 in the after hours. In addition, Apple also revealed some interesting numbers during their financial conference call. A little over three months ago, Apple launched iCloud. The company announced that over 85 million users are syncing their devices through iCloud. This comes from Peter Oppenheimer, Apple’s Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer, during today’s Q1 2012 financial earnings call.

It goes to show that the growth rate is incredible and eclipses the total number of iOS devices sold during the same time frame. During that time frame, 64 million iOS devices were sold! In fact, that’s also more users Dropbox reported in late 2011. I remember, when the service first launched, people said nobody would use it, but look who’s talking now!

iCloud is a free service that stores all your content and seamlessly syncs it across all your devices. It replaced the company’s predecessor paid subscription service called MobileMe with a more seamless and free service. The service being offered for free would probably explain the tremendous growth iCloud is seeing.

Today, Apple announced its best quarter ever, and the figures are incredible! In the after hours, Apple’s share price has soared past $450. At $450 per share, AAPL’s market cap goes to over $420 B, again passing Exxon. Last September, the company’s share price touched $413.23 late in the after market, but closed at $411.63. Then, just a week ago, Apple’s share price has closed at an all-time high of $429.

If Apple closes any higher than $429 tomorrow, it will be a new all time high. In addition, if AAPL’s market cap exceeds $420 billion, then it will become the world’s most valuable company again! Currently, Apple is the world’s most valuable technology company. Its last quarter’s earnings surpassed $40 billion and sold over 15 million iPads, up 111 percent over the year-ago quarter. In addition, Apple sold 37.04 million iPhones, up 128 percent from the year-ago quarter. The company also sold 15.4 million iPods during the quarter, which represents a 21 percent unit decline over the year-ago quarter.

The company’s guidance for the second quarter of fiscal 2012 includes expected revenue of $32.5 billion and earnings per diluted share of $8.50.

Today, Apple announced its financial results for the fourth calendar quarter of 2011 and first quarter of 2012. The street and analysts suggested a $40 billion quarter, but even their predictions were off. The company reported revenue of $46.33 billion and net quarterly profit of $13.06 billion, or $13.87 per diluted share, compared to revenue of $26.7 billion and net quarterly profit of $6 billion, or $6.43 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter. A massive Q1 blowout and this is the company’s best quarter ever. The company’s last quarter revenue was 2x of Microsoft’s and nearly 4.6x of Google’s!

In addition, gross margin was 44.7 percent, compared to the 38.5 percent in the year-ago quarter. International sales accounted for 58 percent of the quarter’s revenue. Apple’s quarterly profit and revenue were both company records. Apple sold 37.04 million iPhones, which is 128 percent from the year-ago quarter. It should be pointed out that copy-cat Samsung only *shipped* (not sold) 28 million smartphones last quarter. Also, the iPhone 4S was a total flop, just like the pundits said. A miserable 37 million sold! The company also sold 15.43 million iPads during the quarter, up 111 percent over the year-ago quarter. During the last quarter, Apple sold 15.4 million iPods, which represents a 21 percent unit decline over the year-ago quarter. This is a new record for iPhone, iPad, and Mac sales during the quarter.

Apple’s guidance for the second quarter of fiscal 2012 includes expected revenue of $32.5 billion and earnings per diluted share of $8.50. You can listen to the live stream of its Q1 2012 financial results conference call here.

Android owners, is this headline surprising to you? How can one smartphone be dominating in smartphone sales? Shocker indeed. Today, Verizon revealed its quarterly earnings for the fourth quarter of 2011, and during the call, they revealed that they sold 7.7 million smartphones. Shockingly, 4.2 million of which were iPhones. Remember, this is a phone that lacks 4G and only comes in one model, while Android phones come in all sizes and specifications. These numbers go to show that the iPhone on all carriers is clearly making a dent in Android sales and marketshare.

Verizon also reported that smartphones now account for 44% of the company’s postpaid customer phone base, which is up from 39% in the previous quarter. However, this strong growth in smartphones significantly reduced the carrier’s margins last quarter as the carrier is absorbing the costly upfront subsidies paid to manufacturers for the devices. . The carrier plans to recover these costs over the length of customers’ contracts, making it willing to take short term hits to profitability to lock in smartphone customers on profitable service contracts.

Apple will report its total number of iPhone sales for the holiday quarter at 2 PM PST this afternoon.